Page 30 of Broken Mafia Prince
“Let’s get out of here!” a voice I recognize as Emilio’s hisses at me.
When I don’t start moving immediately, he grabs my arm and drags me out. I stumble after him, feeling like a failure. I hesitate to get in Emilio’s sedan waiting at the end of the street, knowing that my father won’t let my incompetence go unpunished.
I’m too much of a coward to face him with this failure hanging over my head.
“Get in, Raffaele,” he says impatiently.
The drive back to the house is silent and fraught with tension. Emilio looks furious about something, but it doesn’t feel like the emotion is targeted at me. I want to ask him if Father sent him to get me, or if he made the move on his own.
I don’t know if either option will make me feel better.
Because it means that neither of them trusted me from the start to pull it off.
“Where’s my gun?” He pulls the car over in front of the wrought iron gates of the house. “You’d better not have lost my gun.”
I hold it out to him, but instead of taking it, he just tsks. “Clean it up, I’ll come for it later.”
Surprised, I step out of the car, and it zooms off even before I’ve made it the short distance to the gate. The walk from the gate to Father’s study makes me want to hurl, but I continue bravely.
It feels a lot like exam days from when I was younger, but ten times worse. The study door is wide open, as if he’s been waiting for me. I can’t read the expression on his face, and it makes this situation even more nerve-wracking for me.
“Where is it?” he asks as soon as I step into the room.
My mouth feels as dry as sandpaper, but I manage to get the words out. “I don’t have it.”
“Why?” he asks in a neutral voice.
“There was a problem,” I blurt out. “There wasn’t supposed to be anybody in the warehouse according to Emilio’s intel, but there were, and?—”
He hums, cutting me off. “So this is Emilio’s fault?”
“No, Father, but?—”
A maid races into the room, face as white as a sheet. My eyebrows fly up to my hairline, wondering what could be so important that a member of the staff would barge into Father’s study like this.
Father doesn’t interact with the household staff except when he’s balls-deep in them. Every message has to go from one of his men to Emilio and then to him.
“Sir, it’s your wife.” The maid turns teary eyes at me, and I stop breathing.
“What’s wrong with her?” I ask, panic lacing my words.
“I w-walked into the room to g-give her some tea, and I thought she was asleep,” the woman stammers. “Then I noticed the pill bottle and-and…” she trails off, whimpering.
No.
I turn to run to Mother’s room, but Father’s harsh reprimand stops me. “Where do you think you are going? We aren’t done here!”
I stare at him in shock. “Didn’t you hear what she said?”
“Your mother is dead by now,” he says coldly. “She’s no longer my problem. You and your failure, on the other hand, are my problem.”
I’ve always known Father is a cold bastard, but I never expected this level of nonchalance. How can he feel nothing at all?
“How can you be such a monster!” I roar, all the emotion I’ve buried under for years bubbling to the surface.
He picks up a cigar. “Sit down, and let’s discuss how you’ll make up for this disgraceful failure.”
My chest feels like it’s caving in at the way he’s managed to brush her aside like she’s nothing. Their whole life together, he treated her like an ornament, and even in death, he still dares to disrespect her.
